here has always been much fascination, but little known about
Santa's helpers. More than 3,000 Vendequm -- little people -- live at the North Pole and
work year round building toys, training reindeer,
designing and constructing buildings -- every job imaginable. While
Vendequm is their real name, these mysterious people are known
around the world as elves. The unique and most amazing thing about elves is that they love to
work -- they live to work. They don't enjoy days off or vacation
time. They prefer to work all day, sleep for about an hour, and then go to work again.
There are no other beings like them in the entire world, but where
did they come from?

Elves didn't always live at the North
Pole. They originally started out in Europe, but because they were
different -- smaller than so-called regular people -- many folks
were fearful of them. You see, unfortunately, many times people are
scared of other people or things that they don't understand.

Because the elves were different, they
were were taken from their homes, put in jails and forced into
slave labor for "regular people" for many hundreds of years.
Although the elves did not like this treatment, they were afraid to
try and escape or change the way they were treated because they
feared it would make things worse.

That all changed about 1,800 years ago
-- give or take a hundred years -- when a young
elf by the name of Alistar, which in the Greek language means guardian or
protector, decided it was time to change things for the better.

Alistar is the son of Chloris and
Demetris. From the beginning he believed that the elves were
destined to do great things and he intended to give them all that
chance. So, Alistar got the elves together and told them that the
only way they could live free and use their great abilities to
accomplish great things was to leave Europe and move north. Because
the elves were at such a size disadvantage, Alistar reasoned, they
had to move far away into an area where people would not dare
venture. It would have to be an area so harsh and unforgiving that
the elves could work and live in peace. Alistar told the shocked
group that the only place they could live and be safe was -- the
North Pole.

After several attempts -- and with the
help of sympathetic humans -- Alistar and his
followers successfully freed all jailed elves and those who were
being used as slaves, and they began their trek north. They traveled
mostly at night to avoid anyone seeing them and they got by as best
they could, getting food where they could find it and relying on the
kindness of strangers. Little did they know then that those
strangers would later become members of the "Santa Claus Network" --
a group of people living around the world, who secretly help Santa
complete his mission each and every Christmas Eve.

The further north the elves traveled,
the harsher the conditions -- extreme cold, blizzards, less food and
fewer people to help them. The elves made their way through Russia,
traveling as far north as they could on land to the city of Khatanga.
Amazingly, despite their small size, the elves found they were able
to withstand extreme cold weather with ease.

It was at that point that the elves
secretly boarded a ship as stowaways -- with the help of yet another
kind and sympathetic soul -- and set sail for Severnaya Zemlya. It
was a tough trip -- the coldest cold any of the elves had ever felt.
There was also another rather large problem for the entire elf
population -- they became sea sick. You see, elves do not to this
day like to travel by boat, but with their survival and freedom at
stake, it was a chance they had to take.

Now don't think for a moment that the
elves didn't help out on the boat. One thing elves are not is
freeloaders. At night, when most of the crew
slept, the elves would clean up the boat, repair the shoes, boots and
clothing of the sailors and prepare and leave the crew gifts of food
and small trinkets to show their appreciation, although the sailors
could never figure out where the gifts and mysterious cleaning came
from. Many thought the ship must be haunted, but obviously by a very
clean group of spirits.

This is the elves' way. They work hard
and with amazing speed and accuracy and they thoroughly enjoy giving
gifts. That's why they are perfect to work with Santa Claus at the North
Pole. They all have the same goal -- to provide gifts to people around
the world and spread joy.

Finally, after several days of sailing, the boat docked at Severnaya
Zemlya and quickly and secretly, the elves left the boat and met up
with their contact person -- a friend of a friend in Europe.

The elves felt a bit lost. They were on strange land -- actually
more like strange ice and snow -- and there were no homes for them
to live in and no jobs to work. What were they to do?

Fortunately for the elves, their contact in the Arctic had already
been in touch with Santa Claus at the North Pole. Now, you must remember that this was
several centuries ago, just when Santa was starting out on his mission to
bring gifts and joy to people around the world. So Santa was eager to
get any help he could find. The elves fit
right in and Santa could not have hoped to realize his dream of making a
trip around the world on Christmas Eve had it not been for them.

The elves amazing ability to work at incredible speed made it
possible to create gifts for children around the globe. But one of
the most important things the elves brought to Santa Claus was the ability to
manipulate time, or travel through time.

If it weren't for the elves knowledge in the area of time travel,
Santa
would never have been able to deliver gifts to children around the
world in one night. With the help of the elves, Santa was able to travel
at a great rate of speed and make his deliveries. The faster Santa
traveled,
the more time slowed down for him. Everything seemed to be moving at
a normal rate of speed, but in human time, Santa was going faster than
the speed of light. That is also why -- only in very rare
circumstances -- no one catches Santa delivering gifts on Christmas
Eve.

How is Santa able to do this? He doesn't really know all of
the particulars. All he does know that it works -- and has worked for
over 1,500 years.

So you see, the elves have more to do
with the annual Christmas Mission than anyone else. If it weren't
for the elves, Santa Claus would never to be able to make and then deliver
toys around the world on Christmas Eve.